News

When Somerset lay beneath the sea29 May 2020In a new study, University of Bristol geologists show how the Mendip Hills in Somerset were overwhelmed by the ocean more than 200 million years ago.

Evolution of colour vision in sea snakes28 May 2020New research has revealed the evolution of colour vision in elapid snakes following their transition from terrestrial to fully marine environments, and for the first time, provided evidence of where, when and how frequently the species have adapted their ability to see in colour.

Ancient giant armoured fish fed in a similar way to basking sharks 20 May 2020Scientists from the University of Bristol and the University of Zurich have shown that the Titanichthys – a giant armoured fish that lived in the seas and oceans of the late Devonian period 380-million-years ago – fed in a similar manner to modern day basking sharks.

CT scanning an ancient armoured reptile17 February 2020The aetosaurs were heavily armoured reptiles that lived in many parts of the world in the Triassic period, some 225 million years ago. For the first time, a student at the University of Bristol has CT scanned a specimen to understand how the armour worked.

Boom and bust for ancient sea dragons13 February 2020A new study by scientists from the University of Bristol's School of Earth Sciences, shows a well-known group of extinct marine reptiles had an early burst in their diversity and evolution - but that a failure to adapt in the long-run may have led to their extinction.

Animal embryos evolved before animals27 November 2019A new study by an international team of researchers, led by scientists from the University of Bristol and Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, has discovered that animal-like embryos evolved long before the first animals appear in the fossil record.

Discriminating diets of meat-eating dinosaurs 4 November 2019A big problem with dinosaurs is that there seem to be too many meat-eaters. From studies of modern animals, there is a feeding pyramid, with plants at the bottom, then plant-eaters, and then meat-eaters at the top.

Europe's oldest lake traces 1.4 million years of Mediterranean climate10 September 2019New research by an international team of scientists, led by the University of Cologne and including the University of Bristol, has revealed a lake considered to be the oldest in Europe was first established 1.36 million years ago and has existed continuously ever since.

A new reptile species from Wales named by Bristol student30 August 2019After resting for decades in the storerooms of the Natural History Museum in London, a fragmentary fossil from the Late Triassic (200 million years ago) has been named as a new species by a Masters’ student at the University of Bristol.

First human ancestors breastfed for longer than contemporary relatives 29 August 2019By analysing the fossilised teeth of some of our most ancient ancestors, a team of scientists led by the universities of Bristol (UK) and Lyon (France) have discovered that the first humans significantly breastfed their infants for longer periods than their contemporary relatives.